Episode 99-The Reading Brain

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hi, I'm Maggie. [00:00:02] Speaker B: And I'm Nicole. Welcome to the DAC Dyslexia and Coffee Podcast. We're so happy you could join us. We're both moms and dyslexia interventionists who want to talk about our students and children. What dyslexia is, how it affects our kids, strategies to help and topics related to other learning disabilities will also be covered in this podcast. Parents are not alone, and we want to give voice to the concerns and struggles we are all having. This is a safe place to learn more about how to help our children grow and succeed in school and in the world. Grab a cup of coffee and enjoy the conversation. [00:00:35] Speaker A: Hi, everybody. Welcome to episode 99 of Dyslexia and Coffee Podcast. We're excited that we're all still here. We're going to start today's episode like we do every single time, and that is with the concept of of the week. So the concept of the week is our opportunity as practitioners to kind of pull back the curtain a little bit and let our listeners into an intervention session. So we like to pull things out that we would either be teaching directly to our students or we would be instructing their parents and caregivers on. So today's concept of the week is a revisit. This is one that's always worth a revisit. And also when I've been asking, I've been asked a lot of questions about lately by some of the parents who attend here at dac. So the concept of the week this week is phonological awareness. This is a broad umbrella term, and it is the ability to recognize and manipulate the sounds of spoken language. So this actually applies to words, syllables, onset rhyme, and individual phonemes. So this is a really important foundational skill. It is also often the primary deficit of students with dyslexia. So always worth a revisit and something I've been asked a lot of questions about lately. [00:02:10] Speaker B: Exactly. So welcome to episode 99. We're going to talk about the reading brain today. [00:02:16] Speaker A: Yay. I love talking about the brain and how it works. So this is going to be, I think, a really fun episode for us. It's going to be a little bit technical, but we're going to try the best we can to walk our listeners really through what is going on neurologically when we are learning how to read. Correct. [00:02:45] Speaker B: So the first thing to remember is speech. That human develops oral language automatically. [00:02:54] Speaker A: Yes. [00:02:55] Speaker B: So just so you're aware, you can pick it up, because our brains are wired to pick up oral language without Instruction. [00:03:07] Speaker A: Exactly. You know, human. Human babies in utero are already developing their ability to speak and use oral language. But the brain is not hardwired to [00:03:23] Speaker B: read, which is very interesting. [00:03:25] Speaker A: Right. So really, the areas in our brain that we do use to read, we're kind of like over mapping. Right. Like we're over mapping our oral language onto our written language system. So we're kind of using those pieces of our brain in a way that they weren't originally designed to do, which is fascinating. It's fascinating to me that our human brains can even do that in the first place. [00:03:56] Speaker B: Correct. Right. Who would have thought? So language develops in the left hemisphere of the brain, and so that is where typical readers show activity when they're in an MRI machine, when they're doing reading activities. I think that's an easy way to put all that [00:04:26] Speaker A: together. Yes. [00:04:29] Speaker B: So, like, there's the right side of the brain that's the more creative side of the brain that helps you with, like, other functions that you need. [00:04:42] Speaker A: Yes. [00:04:44] Speaker B: So the interesting part is in those MRIs in students with dyslexia brains, they're being inefficient. Basically. They start maybe in the left hemisphere, run over to the right hemisphere, and then come back to the left hemisphere when they're learning to read. Because there's activity in the right hemisphere in the MRIs in a dyslexic brain. [00:05:09] Speaker A: Yes. Which is fascinating. [00:05:12] Speaker B: It is very fascinating. [00:05:13] Speaker A: And it makes sense when you do know about dyslexia and interactions that we have with our students. Students. So let's talk about typical reading development. So, like, let's talk about what actually happens in our brain when we're actually learning how to read. So some main three areas of our brain that have to do with reading acquisition. So in our kind of more frontal lobe. All right. Is an area of our brain called the Broca's area, otherwise known as the inferior frontal gyrus. Just in case we're needing some technical terms. Okay. That area of our brain [00:06:10] Speaker B: is known for articulation and word analysis, right? [00:06:13] Speaker A: Yes. [00:06:14] Speaker B: So kind of like the phonological area of the brain that breaks those words down into the phonemes and kind of shows the different things that can happen in a word, right? [00:06:27] Speaker A: Yes. So sometimes that's what's called the phonological processor. After information is received, that phonological processor, things move a little bit more to that parietal temporal area. So if we think about where our ear is on our skull, that area right above there is that parietal. That area Is called the phonological assembly. So this is where we're starting to actually make sense of the individual sounds we're hearing. Now we're putting things together. That area is a huge area really of the brain, and it's really responsible for a lot of that processing and starting to make sense of the sounds that we hear moving a little further back in our more accent occipital temporal area. [00:07:35] Speaker B: Think of the back of the head. [00:07:37] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:07:38] Speaker B: Kind of behind your ear, like above your neck, kind of right there. [00:07:44] Speaker A: So funny, listeners can't see us, but both Nicole are like. And I are like pointing to our heads as we do this, which is just making me giggle. That is where we are putting things together. That is sometimes what's known as our orthographic processor. So that is when we can look at a word in print immediately know that is the word we are looking at, and we do not have to sit and sound out that word at all. [00:08:15] Speaker B: And that's where we want those words to be. [00:08:18] Speaker A: That's where we want all our words to be eventually. So those are kind of our three big areas of our brain. Ideally, this is all happening within your left hemisphere. That is for typical readers. That is what we're looking for. So in a typical developing reader, there is what's known as the arcuate vesiculus. Okay. This is a bundle of nerve fibers, and it is running information from that front, middle, back, front, middle, back. And it's doing it many, many, many times. And those fibers become very, very robust. And we can actually see them on FMRI scans, which is really, really interesting in readers that are less developed, that those nerve fibers are less robust and also less organized. So it is interesting to me that we can actually see within FMRI scans what is going on and what areas of the brain are lighting up. I should say the information we are talking about today does pertain to more like alphabetic type languages. Languages who use a different, like tonal system or pictorial system. The areas of their typically developing readers actually would be different, which is fascinating. [00:10:04] Speaker B: That is. [00:10:05] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:10:15] Speaker B: And just so you know, this research has been repeated many, many times with many different researchers in many different studies to show these same results of the pathways of the reading brain. [00:10:32] Speaker A: Yes. One of the original researchers with the Shaywitz studies, that's kind of the original framework, but this has been replicated a lot since her original work. [00:10:51] Speaker B: Correct. And typically. Right. We see that these reading networks are pretty fully formed by that fourth grade level. Right? [00:11:06] Speaker A: Yes, yes. [00:11:07] Speaker B: So thinking about. They're building up those Pathways and they continue to grow. [00:11:14] Speaker A: Yes. [00:11:15] Speaker B: But by fourth grade you usually have a pretty solid system in a typical [00:11:19] Speaker A: reader, which is interesting. And it is also true that that development, so usually that that phonological processing, that Broca, the broca's area, that's more in your front of your brain, that's going to develop first, followed by that assembly, that middle part, followed by that orthographic area. [00:11:40] Speaker B: Right, which makes sense. [00:11:42] Speaker A: Right. Which totally makes sense. So let's think about what's going on in our brains, right. When we are learning to read or kind of what is necessary. We really need strong oral vocabulary skills in order to become proficient readers. It's because a solid oral vocabulary will help children understand and recognize the word in print. We have to be able to first be able to speak and understand words in order to make that transition to printed text. It's one of those areas of research. There's like a lot going on right now about, okay, how do we tell the difference between something that's a developmental language disability versus what is dyslexia? And it's why it's very hard to piece it apart. Because if we do not have that strong oral language component, automatically our ability to read is going to be diminished. So in some readers, being able to piece that apart is actually really, really difficult. And I think the more you understand about neurology, the more that actually makes a lot of sense to me. [00:13:17] Speaker B: Right. [00:13:20] Speaker A: Sometimes too, to kind of make meaning of this. Right. It's not just a one way street. There's many things that need to be working all together for reading to make sense. Sometimes this is called like that, the four part processor, Right. For word recognition. So for example, right. We need to have our phonological processor, our orthographic processor, and our meaning processor. There's also context, right? So like, for example, if I just say the word ball. So play along with me, everybody, right? Like close your eyes for a minute and picture a ball. What are you picturing? For me, I'm thinking of like a playground ball. What are you thinking of, Nicole? [00:14:22] Speaker B: A baseball. [00:14:23] Speaker A: Yeah, right. Makes sense. It's summer as we're recording it. Baseball does absolutely come to mind. And that would be how most people would answer. I would think, right? [00:14:34] Speaker B: I would think so. [00:14:34] Speaker A: Yeah, I would think so. But understand all of a sudden, right, if I say we are going to a ball on Saturday, are you now thinking a baseball? Nope, nope, nope. I'm not. I am no longer thinking playground ball. I'm thinking a dance. A dance? Yeah. I'm Thinking a dance or an event. Right. I might be. Picture. I think in my head, I'm picturing, like, prom being like, a ball. [00:15:07] Speaker B: Right? Yeah. [00:15:08] Speaker A: Yeah. Probably just because our theme was, like, Vietnamese ball. So that's what my. That's my association with that. [00:15:14] Speaker B: Yeah. I was thinking about, like, those movies, like in the 50s where you would see all the ladies dressed up and they were all doing the same dance. [00:15:24] Speaker A: Yes. [00:15:25] Speaker B: Across. [00:15:25] Speaker A: Yes. [00:15:26] Speaker B: Yes. [00:15:26] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. So both of us are actually using our context processor to put meaning to that sentence. We're using things we already know to make meaning of that word ball. So the more I think we understand about this, the more it makes sense where we're working with our readers. You know, sometimes it's like, wow, how can there be so much breakdown? Think about how many things have to be working correctly for us to be accurate and secure readers. I think it's really. It's helpful to put that into context. Correct. [00:16:12] Speaker B: Then when we jump to the dyslexic reader's brain when they do studies. So that frontal area, brocles area still gets stimulated. Right, Stimulated. But then what happens is instead, on the right side also gets stimulated. And then it goes to the right rear for the orthographic processor instead of the left. But that's not really, really where we store words. And so those words kind of don't know where to go, and they don't come back sometimes. [00:16:47] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. [00:16:47] Speaker B: We see in our kids all the time. [00:16:49] Speaker A: Exactly. We're not using the efficient means of storage. And that arcuate basilicus. Right. Is so not. It's not organized. Remember, that's that band of fibers. It's not organized as well. So things kind of get lost in translation for a lot of the kids. When I'm working with students, I talk about, when I was growing up, one of my very best friends, like, our backyard's touched. Okay. So we would go back and forth between each other's houses, and there was a path of grass that was, like, worn down right from us. Just walking back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. That's what I think about when I think about that bundle of nerve fibers. Ideally, we want that to be like that worn path because it's been used [00:17:47] Speaker B: so much and it's growing exactly. [00:17:50] Speaker A: Like it goes back and forth. It's efficient. That's what we're trying to build when we do intervention here, the type of intervention that we do do. That is all to build that arcuate facilitates. [00:18:04] Speaker B: Correct. [00:18:04] Speaker A: That's what we want to be doing with our kids. [00:18:06] Speaker B: And the cool thing is when they've retested students who've had intensive intervention using systematic and explicit instruction, which is what we do, their brain has been rewired to use the left side of the brain. And that fiber band has grown. So isn't that really cool? And it maintains it. It continues to continue to grow and maintain it as they read more and more and the growth continues to get better. [00:18:44] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:18:47] Speaker B: So it's very interesting that they've been able to prove that that's what's happening in the brain when you read and what the intervention we use can actually do to the brain. [00:19:01] Speaker A: Yes. [00:19:01] Speaker B: And it's kind of interesting because at D and C here, we always call it intervention. We don't call it tutoring help, because I know a lot of people do call it tutoring help. But we truly believe that tutoring help is not what we do. Because tutoring is maybe learning how to do math or maybe how to help with homework or doing something that's not rewiring the brain, but helping something that's [00:19:29] Speaker A: gonna supplement whatever academic class you're in right now. Correct. It's not long term instruction. [00:19:40] Speaker B: Right. That's remapping your brain, basically. Because basically it's just helping you through that one class. Right. That's usually what we use tutoring for. Which is why we're very specific when we say intervention here. [00:19:53] Speaker A: Exactly. [00:19:54] Speaker B: And I think that might be why there's so much confusion between the tutoring and the intervention. [00:20:01] Speaker A: Oh, very much so. Very much so. [00:20:04] Speaker B: Not everybody who can tutor can do the intervention. [00:20:07] Speaker A: Yes, yes. It is a different skill set and it's a different set of expectations. Expectations, correct. [00:20:14] Speaker B: And [00:20:18] Speaker A: I mean, I think this stuff is so fascinating. A really cool study that I do want to talk about was called the McCampless Study. I will preface all of this to say this was a study done on adults. The sample size. Excuse me, not the sample size. The population size was relatively small. So there is a little criticism of this study for those two reasons. It was not done on children, it was done on adults, and it was a smaller sample size. But this study took two groups of adults and showed them novel symbols that they had not seen before. Group one were taught three letter words with novel symbols. So not our Alphabet that we were used to seeing. Okay. And they were taught basically three letter words, one word at a time, using symbols that they had not seen before. Group number two was taught individual symbols and they were told this is this sound. So, for example, maybe there was like a square and they Said, this is ah. This is the sound. Ah. Maybe this was a triangle. This is the sound B. Right. And they were taught these individual sound to symbol relationships. What I find really interesting is at first, the adults in group number one who were shown words three letters at a time and taught them as whole words. Initially it looked like that group was doing better. They were reading more words, they were making sense of print more quickly. But after a while, when the text became more complex, all of a sudden that group did not continue to do well. Their progress kind of stalled out. But group number two, who had been taught individual sounds and symbols, did way better and then maintained their growth. [00:22:52] Speaker B: Correct. [00:22:52] Speaker A: To me, this is exactly what happens with our students. [00:22:57] Speaker B: What happens with our students when they're younger, they memorize those words, right? [00:23:01] Speaker A: Yep. [00:23:01] Speaker B: They memorize cat and ta and tom and tub and all those different words, right? [00:23:09] Speaker A: Yes. [00:23:10] Speaker B: So they're like speeding along through all those texts and spelling tests and reading. But then when they get older and they get in a harder class, they start not being able to decode those longer words, more syllables. They just can't do it. And that's when we start seeing them get frustrated and start really realizing you can't just memorize words. [00:23:37] Speaker A: Yes. [00:23:37] Speaker B: You have to learn how to decode them because you're not going to know every word in the. In a page. [00:23:42] Speaker A: Exactly. You know, and I think it's exactly the thoughts behind whole language instruction. The way that many of us in, you know, a certain generation above were taught how to read. We were taught whole words and everything was in the context of meaning. [00:24:06] Speaker B: Right. [00:24:07] Speaker A: We were not really taught essentially phonics. Correct. Right. And it makes sense that a lot of us. Right. Some of us could and did learn to succeed in reading some that way. Right. About 5% of the general population will be able to achieve reading success even in that method. But that's about 5% of the population, guys. Everyone else to some degree, needed some [00:24:41] Speaker B: sort of phonics to help learn to decode something. And I think this study just kind of shows why and that it continues to grow. Obviously, they can't redo it on children. And we know why. Right. Because you can't do harm in a study and that would be harming the children on how to teach them how to read. [00:25:04] Speaker A: Yeah, I think that's such a. Sometimes we are asked, okay, so how come there is not research done specifically on the method that we use? And that's a big part of it. One, the methodology that we use to instruct reading in a structured Literacy standpoint, first of all, it's very complex. There's multiple. There's multiple drills, there's multiple approaches, there's multiple scripts. So one, that'd be difficult. Correct. To study. And then two, it. It is so difficult to do any kind of learning studies on children because you cannot. What you would essentially have to do is create a control whole group and give them zero instruction. [00:25:57] Speaker B: Right. [00:25:57] Speaker A: You can't do that. [00:25:59] Speaker B: You can't do that. [00:26:00] Speaker A: You can't do that. That's not okay. So it is. It is an interesting complexity of. I mean, what we can do is study different approaches and try our best to compare. Right. [00:26:19] Speaker B: And also, you know, looking back at the science of reading, which is the whole body of science, which is what is in what we use. [00:26:29] Speaker A: Yes. [00:26:29] Speaker B: And knowing that it goes back to, like, the 1800s. [00:26:33] Speaker A: Yes. [00:26:33] Speaker B: And that there's been replications of all those studies, those that we're doing. [00:26:38] Speaker A: What is scientifically. I mean, all the way back to Dr. Orton. Right. I mean, he was doing studies of brains. I mean, he did not have the benefit of fmri. Right. So operating at a time that. That did not exist. So he was doing brain research on deceased individuals who had suffered strokes and lost their ability to read. But he was finding deficits in the brain in that language area, similar area that we're finding FMRI scans. We were doing some training last week, and it was kind of funny because there were a lot of side conversations about, wouldn't it be kind of fun if we could do FMRI scans on, like, every single student that comes our way? Obviously, there's a lot. [00:27:24] Speaker B: No, there's a lot of reasons why not. [00:27:26] Speaker A: There's a lot of reasons why not. Right. The exposure to the radiation, the expense, all of that. But, yeah, it would be fascinating. It would be. It would be fascinating. [00:27:37] Speaker B: It would be definitely very fascinating. Well, so I hope you guys liked learning about the brain today. So, Maggie, what's happening beyond dyslexia? [00:27:46] Speaker A: Oh, my goodness. Well, as we record this, it is July and we live in Wisconsin. Right. So the weather always can be quite interesting here. [00:28:01] Speaker B: True. [00:28:03] Speaker A: And in addition to the weather being quite interesting, we also are experiencing a lot of smoke in our atmosphere due to the Canadian wildfires, which are now into Minnesota. So today we are indoors, which is making me kind of sad because it is actually a beautiful day. It's been so hot, so humid, so sticky. Yeah. [00:28:32] Speaker B: And today is perfect. [00:28:34] Speaker A: But we still can't go outside because dangerous levels, actually hazardous to your house to go outside today, which makes me really bummed out. [00:28:47] Speaker B: Me, too. [00:28:48] Speaker A: What is happening for you, Nicole? [00:28:51] Speaker B: Well, as we're recording this, last Thursday, we had our second annual golf outing, and it was super fun. We had people come, and then we had a new group, a couple new groups come, and we made money for our financial aid scholarship program. And it's been. It was so nice to see everybody and to just celebrate what we do and be able to share how much impact you've had in just one year of having our Read and Succeed project. And so I think that really made an impact on the people there. [00:29:29] Speaker A: Very much so. [00:29:31] Speaker B: I think we're really excited to have again next year. [00:29:34] Speaker A: I mean, within one year, we've been able to fully fund five assessments. We have eight students receiving financial aid at the moment, and over 246 instructional hours we have been able to provide to students who otherwise would not be able to afford our services. And I am really, really proud of us for that. Yes, that is really good work for our first year, for our first real year. And I really cannot wait to be able to show that slide. Last year, the event we did on Thursday, we raised some serious funds, and I was thrilled about that. So, like, to be able to use those dollars for good. I can't wait to see what we can do in a year. I'm really proud of that. [00:30:29] Speaker B: Yes, me too. [00:30:30] Speaker A: Hey, well, thank you, everybody, for listening. If you do like our show, please do follow us on social media. Please, like us, share us, give us a review. Those reviews, you guys, that's really how we get bumped up in the algorithms. That's how we get to reach more listeners, and that's how we help more families. So thank you, everybody. [00:30:55] Speaker B: Thank you.